Many booklets require a permanent durable binding that cannot be readily disassembled, tampered with, added to or counterfeited. For example, booklets or passbooks used by many financial institutions and passports used by most governments to control international travel contain important records which, if altered, could be used for illegal purposes. Government passports, for example, include pages that are intended to identify the bearer and to thereby control the movement of certain individuals across international borders. Terrorists, narcotics dealers, fugitives and other illegal aliens with passports that have been altered to include their photograph and physical descriptions can enter countries that they would otherwise be prohibited from. It is understandable, therefore, that a very substantial illegal market exists for counterfeited or altered passports. It will also be appreciated that substantial amounts of government funds are devoted to preventing the sale of counterfeit or altered passport documents. For similar reasons, there exists an illegal demand for counterfeited or altered booklets of other types, such as passbooks used in financial institutions.
One method of supplying the demand for illegal passports or other such booklets is to manufacture a complete counterfeit product. This often is difficult with passports in view of the particular paper and printing processes used by governments to manufacture the passports. However, counterfeits will be attempted if the market demand justifies the costs. In this regard, one approach to preventing counterfeits is to make the true original sufficiently distinct and unusual to significantly complicate the counterfeiting process.
A simpler option for providing illegal passports or other such booklets is to alter an existing booklet to fit the illegal user's requirements. In particular, a substantial market exists for stolen passports which can be carefully disassembled, and re-bound with appropriate new or altered pages in accordance with the requirements of the illegal passport purchaser. For example, the typical passport includes a cover and a plurality of pages that are saddle stitched or sewed at a central fold to define the binding. One page of the passport typically will include a photograph of the intended bearer. The same page or an adjacent page may include other identifying information, such as the height, weight, hair color, eye color and other distinguishing features of the intended bearer.
The illegal merchants may simply disassemble the above described prior art booklet by merely removing the saddle stitching or sewing and separating the pages from one another. Pages bearing a photograph, physical characteristics or certain travel authorizations may then be removed, and substitute pages inserted. The reassembled passport with the substitute pages can then be re-bound by the counterfeiter using readily available saddle stitching or sewing equipment. The illegally altered passport will be extremely difficult to notice for even a trained eye, at least partly because of the many original parts included in the passbook, and the ease with which the original saddle stitching or sewing may be duplicated.
Some bound documents have included a welded seam, with a plurality of separate pages arranged in a stacked array and welded to one another along one edge. A particularly preferred welding process employs ultrasonic welding, as shown for example in U.S. Pat. No. 3,943,024 which issued to the inventors herein on Mar. 9, 1976. In accordance with ultrasonic welding techniques, the paper of the booklet to be welded may be impregnated with an appropriate resin, may have an appropriate resin applied to the edges to be bound or may be a plastic material. These aligned pages are then placed in an ultrasonic welding apparatus which applies both pressure and ultrasonic sound which compresses the aligned edges and causes the resin to weld the adjacent edges into a single substantially integral bound spine. The compression applied to the spine results in the spine having a reduced thickness or height compared to unbound portions of the array of pages. This is in contrast to other binding techniques where the thickness at the spine remains the same or increases. The welded pages are difficult to separate from one another without tearing, and any separation typically can be readily visually observed. It is even more difficult to physically separate the welded pages, take selected pages out and insert new pages without leaving some visual indication of the change. It is also difficult to reweld the pages after such a separation. Unfortunately, the prior art welded books and booklets cannot be readily placed in an open flat condition. Frequent attempts to forcibly urge these books flat for placing printed material on the pages or for carefully inspecting material previously placed thereon can result in a tearing or other such destruction of the prior art welded binding. Thus, a perfectly legitimate passport or other such booklet may appear to be tampered with after such handling.
In view of the above, it is an object of the subject invention to provide a passbook that cannot be readily altered.
Another object of the subject invention is to provide a passbook that is difficult to duplicate by a counterfeiter.
A further object of the subject invention is to provide a passbook that will remain securely bound throughout its normal usage.
Still another object of the subject invention is to provide a passbook that can be provided with an embossed or punched binding stub to further complicate any counterfeiting attempts.
An additional object of the subject invention is to provide a passbook that can be readily bound with equipment that is currently available.